In the next few decades after Wright brothers’ first flight, women aviators became increasingly common and attracted an increasing amount of attention, culminating with Amelia Earhart’s flights in the 1920s and 1930s.
With Earhart’s death in 1937, women aviators became less prominent but continued to contribute greatly to aviation, especially as auxiliary pilots during the Second World War.
In 1784, Elisabeth Thible became the first woman to fly, as a passenger in a hot air balloon. Over a century later, in 1909, women again took to the air, this time in a heavier-than-air craft.
Another French woman, Elise Deroche (1889-1919), who referred to herself as a baroness although the legitimacy of the title was doubtful, became the world’s first licensed woman pilot in 1910.
In the next few years, women in Germany, Italy, and America became licensed to fly, many of them explicitly trying to prove that women were as capable as men in the air.
This photograph of Bessie Coleman in her leather flying helmet, with goggles, and fur-trimmed flight jacket appeared on her Federation Aeronautique Internationale (FAI) pilot’s license. Unable to secure flight training in the United States, she went to France and earned her license. She received the first pilot’s license issued to an African American, male or female, from the Federation Aeronautique Internationale. 1921.
The first American woman to fly solo was Blanche Scott (1890-1970), hired by the Curtiss Airplane Company to demonstrate the safety of their airplanes. For the next six years, Scott flew in aerial exhibitions, performing stunts before excited crowds.
Another woman, Bessie Coleman (1893-1926), attacked barriers of race as well as gender. Although she was not permitted to attend an American flight school because of her race, she eventually earned her pilot’s license in France, becoming the first black woman in the world to do so.
Returning to the U.S. after this accomplishment, she opened a flight school in 1921. Unfortunately, she died in a plane crash just five years later.
There were a number of other notable women pilots in the 1910s and 1920s, including Harriet Quimby (1884-1912; the first woman to fly across the English Channel), Ruth Law (who set a non-stop distance record for both men and women), and Katherine Stinson.
Most famous, of course, was Amelia Earhart. During the Second World War, the Soviet Union put women pilots into combat, mostly flying antiquated bombers to attack German positions in Crimea.
An aviator. 1930.
Women pilots faced similar obstacles, too, no matter in what nation they flew. All met with some degree of resistance from male pilots and, in many cases, from the airplane owners, their families, and the public.
In general, this resistance stemmed from a few basic causes. Some believed that women were too weak or too slow to safely control aircraft moving at high altitudes and high speeds. Flying was considered “unfeminine,” and women who wanted to fly were suspected of being the same.
Although women’s roles in the military remain more limited than those of men, women did begin to receive larger and more technical roles in World War II and in later years. In particular, women were permitted to join the military and to fly in supporting roles for the Allies.
By ferrying planes from factory to air base and across to Europe, for example, women pilots freed men up for combat missions.
However, women’s roles in military aviation stalled out at this point for many years in the U.S. because of continuing public, military, and governmental reluctance to place women in harm’s way.
In fact, it was not until after the Persian Gulf War in the early 1990s that American women were finally permitted to fly combat aircraft in potentially hostile situations.
American Ruth Law (1887-1970). In 1915, Law looped the loop twice for the crowd at Daytona Beach, Florida. 1914.
A vintage postcard showing Therese Peltier, the first woman to pilot a heavier-than-air craft, in Turin. 1908.
Blanche Scott (1885-1970), possibly the first American woman aviator and also the second woman to drive across the United States. 1910.
Hélène Dutrieu (1877-1961), Belgian aviator. Dutrieu was also a cycling champion, stunt motorcyclist, racing car driver, stunt driver and war ambulance driver. She was nicknamed, not unsurprisngly, “The Human Arrow.” 1914.
“Elinor Smith, 16, who will use the Waco plane beside which she is standing in an attempt to set a new altitude record for women. She will also act as co-pilot for George A. Weis, who will take up a Stinson-Detroiter in a new flight endurance attempt.” Smith was nicknamed “The Flying Flapper of Freeport.” 1927.
“Miss Elinor Smith of New York, and Miss Bobby Trout of Los Angeles with the radio equipment which they will take up on the first woman’s refueling flight for endurance. They are all set to take off in their sunbeam plane.” 1927.
Winifred Spooner (1900-1933), English aviator. In 1930 Spooner set off from London with another pilot, Captain Edwards, to try to prove that Cape Town in South Africa could be reached in five days, flying nonstop. One night, with Edwards at the controls, the plane lost height and ditched into the sea off the coast of Italy. Edwards could not swim, so Spooner had to swim the two miles to shore in order to fetch help, leaving Edwards sitting on the fuselage of the aircraft. Spooner died three years later, having caught a cold which developed into pneumonia. 1929.
Ruth Nichols (1901-1960) with her plane. At one point, Nichols held seperate world records for a woman pilot in speed, distance and altitude. Her well-to-do family earned her the name “The Flying Debutante” in the press. 1929.
Matilde Moisant was one of the earliest women pilots in America.
Harriet Quimby was the first American woman to earn a pilot’s license.
Blance Stuard Scott was a daring person, with feats on land and in the air.
“Katherine Sai Fun Choung, a young aviator has just got her pilot license and goes back to China, where she will opened an aviation school for girls.” 1930.
Hélène Boucher Boucher (1908-1934), French aviator. Boucher held a number of women’s speed records before her death in a crash. 1930.
Maryse Hilsz (1901-1946), French aviator. Hilsz gained a reputation for flights of endurance. Together with Amelia Earhart, in 1933 she was awarded joint “Woman of the Year” by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. During WWII she was a member of the French Resistance. 1930.
Maryse Bastiè (1898-1952) and Gilda de Bankford. Bastié’s fascination with flight began when she married a WWI pilot. Her husband died in a plane crash in 1926. She supported herself through aerial acrobatics, later buying her own plane. She rose to the rank of Captain in the French Air Force, and was herself killed in an air crash. 1930.
“Florence Lowe Barnes, good-natured “Tomboy of the Air,” who will enter the First National Women’s Air Derby, which will be flown from here to Cleveland starting August 18th. She is from California.” 1930.
Amy Johnson CBE, (1903-1941), a pioneering English aviatrix, seen here adjusting the engine of a de Havilland DH60 Moth. Flying solo or with her husband, Jim Mollison, Johnson set numerous long-distance records during the 1930s. She was killed in bad weather while attempting to deliver an RAF aircraft for Air Transport Auxiliary. 1930s.
Jean Gardner Batten (1909-1982), New Zealand aviator. Known as “Greta Garbo of the skies,” in 1936 Batten made the made the first solo flight from England to New Zealand. Two years later, she was the first woman to be awarded the medal of the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale. 1934.
Lady Louise Montagu, daughter of the Duke of Manchester, standing next to her plane, having taken her “A” license and completed a bling flying course, Heaton Airport, Chester. 1934.
English aviatrix Amy Johnson (1903-1941) shown at a landing in Berlin. She was the first woman to make a solo flight from London to Australia in 1930. (Photo taken in 1935).
Elisabeth Lion (1904-1988), French aviator. Lion was awarded Chevalier of the Legion of Honor. 1938.
“Amelia Earhart, first lady of aviation, is shown immediately after she landed her Lockheed Vega plane at the Los Angeles Municipal Airport, July 2, after completing a transcontinental flight from the East. Miss Earhart failed to qualify, due to delays encountered on her flight. She said it was the most hazardous trip she had ever made. The crowd gave her a tremendous ovation as she brought her ship to the ground, during the second day’s events of the National Air Races.” (Photo taken in 1933).
Aida de Acosta flying the airship Baladeuse in 1903 – the first woman to pilot a powered aircraft.
Willa Brown, the first African-American woman to receive a commission as a lieutenant in the U.S. Civil Air Patrol.
Bessie Coleman in 1922.
World’s first female combat pilot, Sabiha Gökçen.